Hunt Your African Lion Now!

(African Lion Hunting is Under Pressure)

Lion hunting in Africa is currently under attack from multiple fronts.  One of the primary threats to future lion hunting is not even in Africa!  In November of 2012, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced that the African lion may soon receive protection under the Endangered Species Act.  The United States is considering this action to try and curb the threat of “unregulated” hunting.  Many Americans participate in trophy hunting and bring their lion trophies back into the US.

By listing the African lion as endangered in the United States, it would not make hunting lions in Africa illegal. It would make importing the trophies into the US illegal.  The thinking is that this would reduce the amount of hunters willing to pay the high prices currently being paid for a trophy that is not importable.

This would reduce the amount of lion hunting significantly, but would also reduce the amount of money being brought into the rural areas that are currently coexisting with lions.  As soon as the lion loses its economic value, poisonings and shootings of lion would increase quickly.

Hunters and hunting actually benefit Africa’s lions – as well as its humans.  Revenues from hunting generate over $200 million annually in the remote areas of rural Africa.  It is the hunting of lions and the resulting influx of cash into the lions’ home ranges that is helping to maintain the coexistence of the local populations and the lion!    Without hunting, the demise of the free ranging lion in Africa will accelerate.  When conservation and the financial incentives that hunting provides are lost or mismanaged, the value local communities place on the sustainability of lion populations greatly diminishes.  This leads to humans killing lions as a direct result of human-lion conflict.

According to most current studies, there are between 32,000 and 35,000 African lions left in the wild.  It is estimated that in 1960 there were approximately 100,000 African lions living in the wild. That means that 2/3 of the wild lions have disappeared in the last 50 years!  If this trend were to continue, there would only be approximately 10,000 wild lions left 50 years from now.  But with the rapidly growing population in Africa, it is inevitable that the pressure on African lions will accelerate faster than the trend of the recent past.

Ignorance of the real pressures facing lions today ( human population expansion, disease, native’s low protein diets and the indiscriminate snaring of bush meat, etc… )  and the subsequent politicizing of the plight of wild lions can only lead to eventual up-listing of the African lion to Appendix 1 under the CITES Treaty.  This will likely doom the African lion to be found only in closely guarded parks, high-fenced enclosures and zoos.  Only by placing and keeping an economic value on the lion and the habitat that it occupies can the future survival of Africa’s wild lions be assured!

So if you are thinking of hunting Africa’s greatest cat, the time to do it is now!  Prices will only go up and the availability of lions (especially wild lions) will go down.  Currently, all cat hunting is closed in Zambia.  Botswana has been closed to lion hunting for several years and will not open within the foreseeable future.  Mozambique is currently the best country for a traditional baited lion hunt.  Prices have not skyrocketed like they did when Botswana reopened to hunting in 2005.  Current prices are running around $75,000 and range up to $100,000 for the best concessions.

Unless you are wealthy, this leaves the South African lion hunt as the most affordable hunt on the continent. Most South African lion hunts are undertaken in a high fence enclosure of several thousand acres.  Although the lion may have been raised in captivity, it will likely be a more dangerous hunt, as many of these cats have lost their fear of man!  Add the cat’s lack of fear for man to the fact that most of these hunts are done via tracking on foot, and you can still experience one of Africa’s greatest hunts.

South African lion hunts currently range from $14,000 to upwards of $35,000.  Lioness hunts are available for $6000-$8000, and offer the same exciting hunt for significantly less money.

I think that lion hunting will most likely be shut down in the future due to the ignorance of the factors affecting lions and the increasing political pressure from the anti-hunters.  So if you want to stalk the king of the jungle, you should book your hunt NOW!!!

If you wait too long, you will only have regrets instead of great memories!

Authored by: John Martins  1/30/2014